The REAL Truth About the IMF's Gold-sale

The World Gold Council released its most recent statistics on (official) central bank activity in the global gold market, and in doing so made it very clear what the “game plan” is for the IMF in dumping its gold.

The WGC numbers are nothing less than shocking. The same European Central banks which were foolishly dumping 500 tons of their gold per year onto the market (and who knows how much they dumped unofficially?), have sold only only 1.8 tons in the first nine months of the newest “sales agreement” of those central banks. And virtually all of that gold was expressly for the minting of gold coins – to satisfy surging investor demand.

Consequently, with the anti-gold cabal having clearly exhausted all the gold reserves which those central bankers were willing to squander, nothing remains but a dwindling pile of IMF gold – the remnants of the 400-ton sale. This one sale has been announced and re-announced so many times over the last 2+ years, that I'm sure many casual observers to the gold market assume that there have been several such sales.

After allowing India to scoop-up half the 400 tons in one “gulp” (and seeing the bullish reaction in the market), the IMF bankers were given strict instructions by the anti-gold cabal: no more large, private sales. Instead, all gold must be dumped onto the market in a manner designed to do the absolute maximum amount of “technical damage” to the market (i.e. just like all the other central bank gold).

In that respect, we have the following data. Eric Sprott, the respected head of Sprott Asset Management (who recently started-up his gold-trust “PHYS”) tried to buy the last half of the IMF gold – but was refused, without explanation. It was widely rumored that China's government had also tried to buy this gold.

What has the IMF actually been doing with that gold? Since the middle of February, it has dumped 38.7 tons of gold onto the market, according to the World Gold Council. This leaves the IMF with somewhere around 150 tons remaining. Let me put that into perspective. Instead of the market expecting 500 tons of central banks' gold to be made available every year, the market now sees a mere 150 tons – and no more on the horizon.

This is occurring as central banks have switched to become net buyers, themselves, for the first time in decades, and last year they purchased (on a net basis) the most gold in 50 years. Regular readers will recall that I have frequently written on this subject – both the (absurd) IMF propaganda, and the significance of central bank behavior and the new “sales agreement”.